Bernson Urges Disbanding of Water Rate Panel : Utilities: In a letter to the mayor, the city councilman cites ‘prejudicial attitudes’ by some members against Valley interests.

Testing Mayor Richard Riordan’s commitment to the San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson has asked Riordan to disband a blue-ribbon panel on water rates because he maintains that it won’t give Valley residents upset about their bills a fair hearing.

Bernson has asked that the Mayor’s Task Force on Water Rate Restructuring be abolished because of “preconceived and prejudicial attitudes” held by several of its members against Valley interests, the lawmaker wrote in a letter to Riordan.

Riordan ordered the blue-ribbon panel, created by former Mayor Tom Bradley, to reconvene in September to study complaints that the city’s new water rate system was unfair to Valley customers.

The mayor’s office declined comment on Bernson’s letter.

According to Bernson’s office, Valley homeowners who have protested water rate increases were called “crybabies” by one task force member at an Oct. 14 meeting of the panel. Moreover, at a Nov. 4 meeting, during a debate on whether to hold one of its public hearings in the northwest Valley--as Bernson had asked--some task force members expressed the view of “who cares what Bernson wants,” said Sandy Clydesdale, a Bernson aide.

Because of such remarks and attitudes, Bernson in a letter this week urged Riordan to dismiss the panel and appoint new members. “This attitude cannot and should not be tolerated, nor should these meetings be used to attack or belittle me,” he wrote.

The water rate issue has nagged the Riordan Administration for weeks. Valley lawmakers first asked the mayor to intervene on the water rate issue last summer after residents complained of skyrocketing Department of Water and Power bills.

Riordan, who scored his biggest victory margins in the Valley, in September asked the task force to hold hearings on the effect of the new rates and named four Valley residents to the panel in an apparent bid to placate Bernson and Councilwoman Laura Chick. Both lawmakers, who represent the West Valley, said they fielded hundreds of constituent complaints last summer about new DWP bills.

The complaints arose after homeowners received bills based on a new rate system that took effect in February. That system, designed to promote conservation, has two rate tiers. The first and lower tier is for customers who use less water, the higher tier for larger consumers. The second tier rate kicks in when a customer uses more than twice the water amount as an average DWP residential customer.

In addition to the high and low tiers, there are summer and winter rates--the former being higher.

The rates are unfair to the Valley, critics have said, because Valley residents have larger lawns that require more watering. Also, the Valley is hotter in the summer, further increasing the area’s water demands.

But supporters of the new water rate system say it correctly encourages conservation. Moreover, they contend the new system has meant higher rates for only about one-fourth of DWP’s customers while the remainder have enjoyed reductions.

The system now in effect was largely created by a task force established by former Mayor Bradley.

But when Riordan ordered a fresh look at the system based on Valley complaints, he turned to the old Bradley task force--supplemented by the four new Valley members--to do the job.

According to some, the panel is somewhat resentful of having its initial work criticized.

“There’s some pride of authorship,” said Gerald Gewe, the DWP liaison to the task force. Still, Gewe said he is confident the panel can fairly weigh the Valley’s complaints. He also said he has not heard the remarks Bernson cited during the panel’s private meetings. Gewe said, however, the meetings are large enough--with about 30 people present--that remarks could be “said in undertones that I might not hear.”

But Clydesdale and Harry Wilcox, a Valley businessman appointed to the panel at Bernson’s recommendation, insisted that such remarks have been made. Both said they could not or would not attribute them to any one member.

“There’s a lot of Bernson-bashing and Valley-bashing going on,” Clydesdale said.

Another Valley task force member, realtor Rana Linka, said she does not agree that the task force is incorrigibly prejudiced.

“It’s not hopeless,” she said. “Yes, it’s difficult and we have a lot to prove. But I want to stay with it and try to get the water rates changed. And how much time are we going to lose if we drop this committee and start all over again.”

Linka was named to the panel by Riordan at Chick’s recommendation.